


The Distance Between Two Points

by KayNight



Series: This World of Ours [1]
Category: Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, DCU, DCU (Comics), DCU (Movies), Suicide Squad (2016), Under the Red Hood
Genre: Gen, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, M/M, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-27
Updated: 2015-07-27
Packaged: 2018-04-11 13:44:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,538
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4437752
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KayNight/pseuds/KayNight
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>death is negotiable in a world where gods can be tried in a court of law. </p><p>or, the suit in the case is more of a monument than a memorial because Jason Todd is anything but dead.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Distance Between Two Points

**Author's Note:**

> written pre-release of BvS, still can be squished into canon. a sort of companion piece to "there's a pain goes on and on". jason todd in the dceu.

There is a man (more boy than man, but for what he’s been through it would be unfair to call him anything less than a man) sitting at a bar in one of the dozens of dives tucked away in the lower east side. 

He’s desperately trying to get the grit out from under his nails, scraping away at his cuticles and biting down to the quick at the dirt that only he can see. 

He’s bleeding, again. It happens every now and then, when he goes too far (or just far enough). 

He stares at the red oozing from the abused skin around his thumb dully, not registering the discomfort nor the sensation as the liquid runs down his finger. Slowly, as if trying to remember what the proper course of action is when one starts bleeding, he grabs for one of the many discarded beer coasters scattered across the bar and presses it to the wound. 

He watches in something almost akin to fascination as the red seeps through the white napkin, staining the brightly colored advertisement on it a bright scarlet. As the flow of blood slows to a sluggish stop, he finds himself at loss for a moment.

He feels anything but inclined to resume his fevered ministrations, flicking his tongue across his lips and tasting the copper smeared across them, but the itching is beginning again, the urge, the need to dig and scrape and clear away the dirt forever underneath his nails, clinging into his skin, clawing its way in. 

But in that moment, in that lapse of fixation, his attention is drawn away rather sharply by a sound he has not yet heard in this lifetime (as for the other…). 

The TV had been a low buzz for the past hour or so, meaningless chatter that fell on deaf ears, but at the sound of that voice, the man starts in his seat and his eyes snap upward, glued to the screen lined with static. 

“…and I promise, as CEO of Wayne Enterprises, a company I consider to be my family…”

His senses are flooded with information. His heart thudding in his ears, the pressure of his fingers digging into his thighs seeking anything to anchor himself on, the burn of alcohol at the back of his throat and the smell of formaldehyde that even now still clings to his skin- how difficult it suddenly became to breath, as if all of the air had whisked away just out of reach, dragged out of his lungs and then shoved back in. 

“…that justice will be delivered upon those responsible for this horrible tragedy.”

He does not know this, but it has almost been a year since Jason Todd clawed his way out of his own grave, the Pit still singing in his veins and sinking its fingers into an already broken mind. 

Jason remembered that man’s name before he could even recall his own. Even with his name seared into Jason’s brain, he had no memory, no sense of purpose, no feeling attached to that name. 

But in that moment, with Bruce Wayne’s words still ringing in his ears, he remembers. 

He remembers what it felt like to be held by someone, to be held by Bruce, to be lifted off of his feet into a hug that nearly crushed the wind from his lungs but what felt like coming home. The feeling of having his hair ruffled, the rush of indignation tinged by pleasure and affection, and the pressure of lips against his forehand and the fleeting wish for just a little bit more. 

Longing. That was the feeling that had carved out the hollow space in his chest, somewhere just beyond the intersection of the T stitched into his skin. It ached more than any wound; it burned more than the weight of graveyard dirt suffocating him and sealing him in. 

In the wake of that wave of longing, that pure sense of loneliness, of being bereft, Jason realizes that he has forgiven Bruce for not being able to save him that night. For not finding him when he crawled his way out of that graveyard, eyes glowing gold and still half dead. But when hears him talk of justice, of bringing the perpetrators of tragedy before judgment, he feels rage filling him up, sealing up the cracks of his consciousness and making him whole in a way that he has not been since before that timer clicked down to zero. 

With bile rising in his throat and a scream threatening to tear past his lips he surges up from his stool, but the blood rushes to his head so quickly he has to grab the counter to remain upright. 

Darkness eats way at his vision and the room lilts, he swallows roughly, grabbing the bar so tightly he can hear it groan under his grip. As his sight comes rushing back, along with the low murmur of the bar, he hears the bartender barking at him get the hell out of his bar if he’s going to be sick. 

Jason jerks his head in a mockery of a nod, stumbles back from the bar, and barely manages to throw down some change before he darts out the door. The second he steps out the front door he starts running, stumbling and tripping his way down the block, till he finds himself poised over a sewer grate- into which he promptly retches up the half a beer he downed at the bar and whatever it was he scavenged up that morning to hold him over for the day. 

With one hand propped on the lamppost next to him, and the other wiping at his mouth, Jason feels hot tears welling up and spilling over, carving tracks down his flushed cheeks. 

He chokes back a sob and bites down hard on the swell of his palm before he desperately tries to get his ragged breathing under control, taking deep gasping breaths and tightening his grip on the lamppost till his knuckles turn white from strain. 

Jason can just hear Bruce now, saying those words Jason knows the bastard believes with all his heart: “Justice will be delivered upon those responsible.” 

He smashes his fist into the side of the lamppost, feeling his knuckles split, and for the second time today, the hot rush of blood across his skin. He ignores it. 

He straightens out his back, taking one last deep breath before scoping out his surroundings, his mind slowly clearing and that anger burning in his belly filling him up with something that feels a lot like purpose.

Across the street he spots a newsstand, barren of any patrons at 3 o’clock in the afternoon, and Jason sees that face again. He sees Bruce’s face again. 

Not even checking for traffic, he staggers across the street. 

It’s the Sunday Edition of the Gotham Gazette, the devastation of Metropolis blazing across the front, and a portrait of Wayne Enterprises CEO Bruce Wayne nestled neatly in the right hand column. 

A quote accompanies the picture. 

“Justice will be delivered upon those responsible,” the words are past his lips before he can even think to say them, and the bitterness laced into his own voice sounds foreign to his ears. 

Jason remembers what it feels like to be beaten and broken by the endless swings of a crowbar in the hands of a madman, to be blown up and killed- only to be dragged back to life kicking and screaming, and thinks about that man who still roams free. Who is still alive.

Chills run up the back of his neck, and a plan begins to form just on the tip of his tongue. 

“Justice will be delivered upon those responsible,” he whispers again, rolling the words off of his tongue like a prayer and he almost catches himself laughing at the sheer hypocrisy. 

The sharp voice of the old woman manning the newsstand rouses him, “I don’t want no trouble here, young man, buy something or be on your way.”

She’s poised over a basket of plastic wrapped baked goods, with a red sharpie in one hand and a blueberry muffin that probably tastes just as good as its wrapping in the other. She’s also shooting him a glare that would make any other man take several generous steps backwards. 

Unfazed, Jason meets her stormy eyes and finds his lips twisting into something akin to a smile, ”You won’t be getting any trouble from me, ma’am. I just need a copy of the Gazette.”

She narrows her eyes at him, all suspicion and stiff grace, and gestures for his money. Watching the way she stares disdainfully at his crumpled stack of one dollar bills, counts it, and makes a grand show of stowing it away somewhere beyond his sight, Jason remembers how much he loves this damn city. 

As she hands over a rolled up copy of the Gazette her frown deepens and she asks him if there’s anything else she can get for him, and if not, then he should be on his way. 

Jason’s smile grows.

“Actually, you wouldn’t happen to be willing to sell me that sharpie, would you?”


End file.
